Free Republic

@RandPaul On @MeetThePress, I made it clear: America needs diplomacy over endless war, real debate before military action, and fiscal sanity, not $2–3 trillion deficits from either party. I’ll stand with President Trump when he’s right and stand up to government overreach when he’s not.

Sen. Rand Paul on Sunday questioned the wisdom and legality of President Donald Trump’s policies toward Venezuela and suspected drug dealers coming from its coast. Speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” the Kentucky Republican again raised concerns about the legality of the Trump administration’s strikes on boats that it claims are carrying drug traffickers, as well as the president’s statement that the United States might conduct direct attacks on Venezuela’s territory. “When you kill someone, you should know, if you’re not at war, not in a declared war, you really need to know someone’s name at least,” Paul said. “You...

Amid a wave of U.S. military strikes in the Caribbean and plans for covert operations in Venezuela, Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., is leading a bipartisan effort to force a vote to stop President Trump from unilaterally declaring war on the South American nation. Kaine, a longtime proponent of Congress' powers to declare war, filed the resolution late Thursday, a move that will force the Senate to take up the legislation after a 10-day waiting period. Sens. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and Rand Paul, R-Ky., co-sponsored the plan. Kaine said concerns about war in the Latin American region are growing. "The pace...

When challenged that killing citizens without due process is a war crime, the vice president responded that he "didn't give a sh*t." Sometimes in fits of anger, loud voices will say they don't care about niceties such as due process—they just want to kill bad guys. For a brief moment, all of us may share that anger and may even embrace revenge or retribution. But over 20,000 people are murdered in the U.S. each year, and yet somehow we find a way to a dispassionate dispensation of justice that includes legal representation for the accused and jury trial. Why? Because...

The Washington establishment is once again working overtime to undermine the best of President Trump’s restraint-oriented foreign policy instincts. The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which Congress is currently debating, includes three separate provisions that reduce the president’s ability to reposition or withdraw U.S. troops from Syria, Europe, and South Korea. The hypocrisy is blatant. Congress is content to avoid tough votes by abdicating its warmaking powers to the executive branch. It has not formally declared war since the Second World War. Yet when the President displays a willingness to end wars and consolidate America’s overstretched military, Congress seeks to...